FSPA's Leadership Team attended the Leadership Conference of Women Religious annual assembly in Florida Aug. 14-16, 2024. More than 800 attended the meeting this year. LCWR represents about two-thirds of the nearly 36,000 sisters in the United States. Father Bryan Massingale offered a keynote address. Global Catholic Sisters Report covered Father Massingale's address. Here's a snippet of that coverage, a link to the full article and an opportunity to watch his address.
From Global Catholic Sisters Report:
Father Massingale is a priest and professor specializing in social ethics, and has a passion for advancing a Black approach to Catholic theological ethics, focusing on the impact of religious faith as an instrument of social injustice and a catalyst for social transformation.He cited Pope Francis saying we are not in an era of change, but in a change of eras, and that the rise of hatred and division stems from fear of that change. "We are no longer a white, Christian nation, and many white Christians are fearful and angry," Massingale said. The changes are "experienced as an existential threat that undermines one's self-identity and the foundations upon which some believe the country was built." He cited scholar Walter Brueggemann, saying that when those losses are unacknowledged, unprocessed and "un-mourned," it turns to violence and prevents any kind of progress.
Read LCWR assembly invites sisters to become 'catalyst for social transformation'
Watch Father Massingale's keynote address on the LCWR assembly website.